Bio Mapping Workshops

There are two slighty different formats a Bio Mapping workshop can take:

1 Flexible
The workshop location and start time are advertised localy and through art world channels. Any text and images from this website can be used to publicise the event. The event runs in a flexible way for about 4 hours with who ever comes during this time. A local assistant is needed to help with explaining parts of the project and helping kit people out and taking deposits from people.

2 Formal
This type of workshop normally takes 3 hours, and is designed for 8 people who have signed up to take part in the workshop beforehand.

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Each participants is fitted out with a Bio Mapping device and then invited to go for a walk in the local area for a period of about an hour.

People are encouraged to go for a walk where ever they like but to try and think about the events that pccur and the choices they make during their walk.

Upon their return, the data is downloaded from the Bio Mapping device and each person's emotion map generated by the mapping software.

Each person is given enough time to study their own personal map before talking to the other participants about their experiences during the walk.

Any particular associations that people can make between the arousal data and their experiences are recorded on the map as a spatial annotations.

After each participant has finished discussing their walk, all the tracks are combined to create a communal emotion map of the area.

This is the the setting for the closing discussion that raises the larger question of what this communal map represents and how it might be used by the participants.

If the facilities exist peoples personal maps can be printed out for people to take home as a souvenier of their experience. The participants can also download the data from their walk from this website and visualise it using Google Earth on their own computer. Depending on the context of the workshop it can be useful to raise particular local issues for discussion or focus on how this workshop might fit in with other acitivies being undertaken.

Participants gathering round to talk about their experiences during their walk.

Follow up workshop at John Kelly Boys Technical College which focused on expanding the ideas around Bio Mapping with group brainstorming.

The San Francisco Emotion Map is complete. At the end of July I will be Bio Mapping in Tokyo. Until then I am working on my book and setting up a project in Stockport and Stoke Newington. Please see my main site for more info.

Bio Mapping has won the SciArt R&D award which will give me time to write a book about the project and commission some critical / historical essays around the project. If you are intersted in writing one get in touch!